Mericcup Hunger Games
by bluemangosmoothie
Summary: One winner and twenty-three losers. Only if your a loser you're dead. This is a Mericcup version of the Hunger Games, with no other outside characters other than their families. I ain't plagiarizing by the way. So this is a really short summary and I'll do a better one later. Rated T because of gore and violence. *Spoilers if you haven't read Hunger Games*.
1. Chapter 1

Hey this is like something I thought about while I was in ELA and I was like WOAH. So here it is! Yay! This is also my first Mericcup only fan fiction so bear with me.

I do NOT own Hunger Games, HTTYD, and Brave characters though a few characters are of my manifestation. Also some parts are taken from the book ad I don't mean to plagiarize or sell this off as my own. It is not. By the way, I like turtles. Randomness moment!

Chapter 1

The Reaping

My hands reach out for the triplets' warmth, but I find nothing but cold sheets. They must have woken up with bad dreams and slept with Mum. I don't blame the poor boys. It's the Reaping, the day when the Capital chooses two tributes to play in their games to the death. They're now twelve so they get put into the selection.

I push my legs over the edge of the bed and place them into their boots. The worn leather grooved to fit them perfectly. I try to run a brush through my mane of wild red hair but to no avail. I look over to my brothers, Hamish, Hubert, and Harris, their red hair just as wild as mine, and Dad. I pull Dad's old hunting jacket over my shoulders and start out to the Meadow.

It is the Reaping, no work for the beaten down souls of the Seam. The Reaping isn't until two, may as well sleep in if you can.

Our part of town is nicknamed the Seam. It is where all the poor, unwanted citizens of District Twelve live. Most habitants have dark hair and eyes and olive toned skin. My family's hair is a rarity. Mum being the only one without red hair, the boys and I all have wild red hair and crystal blue eyes. So did Dad, before the mine explosion killed him and countless other husbands and wives.

I make it to the fence where I shimmy under and take off to the surrounding woods. The fence is supposed to be electrified twenty-four hours a day, but due to regular power outages, it is normally dead. The fence is supposed to keep predators out and citizens in.

"District twelve, where you can starve to death in safety," I glance around, unsure whether someone heard me. I use to scare my Mum to death with the things I would say. I would just blurt random things out, no matter where I was.

My feet find the regularly trodden path that I use to hunt. I retrieve my bow and arrows and game bag from a hollow log. This morning I am lucky, I catch a squirrel, two hare, and a nicely sized raccoon.

I walk to a rocky cliff where a brunette sits, staring out into the sky. Gale. My friend since I was twelve. His father was killed in the same blast as mine. He turns, hearing my footsteps on the path.

"Morning, Red," says Gale. I didn't tell him my name until a month after meeting him. It's really Merida but he calls me Red anyways. Also that, because a baby cardinal began to follow me around. It had a sweet little song but it scared off the prey with it, so I had to kill it.

"Look what I shot," Gale holds up a loaf of bread with an arrow in the middle. Making it look like he shot it.

I sit next to him, on the ledge, "The baker's generous today." Normally he haggles on prices, but the games must be getting to him.

"Yeah, he even wished me luck," Gale sits back, tears the loaf into two pieces, and hands a piece to me. This can feed Mum, the boys, and I tonight after the Reaping. "It's not just me who needs luck now," Gale says bitterly. "Rosalie is going in."

Rosalie, Gale's little sister. She is in the triplets' year at school. She is small, delicate and whenever I'm around her, I feel like I need to protect her from the Seam's cruel nature. I love her as much as I love the boys.

I put the piece of bread into my pocket and I feel a touch of soft, cold cheese. Mother must have put in my pocket last night. I pull it out and share it with Gale, who is staring out over the horizon to a better world.

Gale shatters the silence, "We could do it you know. Run off into the woods. You and I, we could make it."

I'm dumbfounded by this sudden declaration. I scramble for a response.

"We wouldn't make it five miles," I say, hoping Gale does not try. Gale lapses into a thoughtful, angry silence again. I divide the spoils between us. Gale has shot a few squirrels, a rabbit, and an unlucky turkey. Bunches of strawberries lay at the bottom.

We part ways after an hour of sitting and nibbling on cheese and hunting. We divide at the fence.

"See you in the square," I say, hauling my game bag.

"Wear something pretty," Gale says flatly.

I make it home, the boys are already in dark pants, and white shirts that Mum pressed last night. Mum is wearing a light green dress down to her calves. She hands me a light blue dress and black ballet flats that I change into without a protest. She brushes out my wild red hair in a way that I never could and miraculously braids it into an up do. Before long, it is time to walk to the city center where they have the Reaping.

Camera operators perch on rooftops like vultures, ready to record anything that happens. All of Panem will watch the Reaping to see who was chosen.

I stand with a group of sixteen year olds from the Seam. We all exchange terse nods. The different age groups are belted off and away from each other. Twelve year olds in the back and eighteen year olds at the front.

The huge town square clock strikes two o'clock and the mayor steps forward to begin the story of the Hunger Games. The districts, at the time thirteen, banded together and rebelled against the Capital but the Capital destroyed District 13 in response. Now as punishment, the Capital has the twelve Districts send two tributes, one boy and one girl, to the Capital, then to an arena to fight to the death against twenty-two other tributes, only one can be the survivor and be crowned Victor of the Hunger Games. Out of the seventy-four Hunger Games, so far only two have won. Haymitch Abernathy who is still alive and the other tribute is dead.

"'M 'ere. Don' worzies," Speaking of the devil, Haymitch stumbles onto the stage, drunk. He sits down onto one of the chairs on the stage and stares at the clouds like a child. He's normally down at the Hob, the secret black market, sitting at the bar and drinking with friends he picked up since the games he one.

Effie Trinket, the Hunger Games Tribute Manager waltzes onto the stage from the Justice Building, the home of the Mayor and his family. She sits onto a chair next to Haymitch. Her pink wig is brighter than ever. Haymitch tries to give her a hug and she battles him off with her purse.

The mayor ends his speech and sits next to Haymitch. Effie toddles up, bright and bubbly as ever.

Effie gives her signature, "Happy Hunger Games! And may the odds be _ever _in your favor!" Her capital accent makes me want to laugh. How odd it is. It goes up like a question at the end.

Through the crowd, I spot Gale looking back at me. He has a ghost of a smile and I give it back. As Reapings go, at least this one has a slight entertainment factor.

Its time for the drawing. Effie Trinket pipes as always, "Ladies first!" and crosses over to the pink glass ball holding the girl names. She reaches in, digs for a slip, and pulls a paper out. Everybody draws a collective breath. _Please not me, please not me, please not me._ I am feeling nauseous.

Effie Trinket crosses the podium, smoothes the paper, and reads out the name in a clear voice. And it's not me.

It is Rosalie Hawthorne. Gale's sister.

The breathe feels like it was punched from me. I see Gale shouting as Rosalie walks by, her brown little braids coming loose. Gale is pushed back from the crowd. Peacekeepers pointing a gun to his head.

You can see that he wants to save his sweet sister from this. I feel my heart breaking. Rosalie makes it up the stage, fists tightened at her sides.

"Any volunteers?" Effie asks. My brain clicks. I could save her!

I push past the sixteen year olds, "I volunteer!" The peacekeepers push me back. I push them back. "I volunteer as tribute!"

Effie seems startled and Rosalie shocked. Gale stares at me as if I'd grown another head. The peacekeepers push me forward to the stage where Rosalie still stands. I climb the stairs to the stage and the little girl snaps out of it.

"No Merida! No!" She grabs my dress as the peacekeepers pull her away.

"Rosalie. Let. Go." I grit my teeth. This is making me too emotional. If I show any weakness, then I will lose my only chance of looking tough in front of the camera. Rosalie is pulled off me and taken back to the Twelve-Year-old pen in the back.

"Bravo! Now that's the spirit of the Hunger Games!" Effie pulls me over to the podium, "Tell me your name?"

I speak clearly into the microphone, "Merida Dunbroach."

Effie smiles in an odd way. "So you wanted the fame and fortune she was going to get, huh?"

"Right." No use explaining. It would take too long. Effie's pink hair must be a wig, because I can see that it's crooked.

Effie Trinket smiles, "Now let's give this young girl a round of applause!" The square is silent. No hands clap. They must know me from the Hob when Gale and I trade our spoils to get money for what we need.

Then something extraordinary happens. At least I don't expect because I didn't think District Twelve cares for me. A shift has occurred and an old man pushes three fingers to his mouth and holds them out to me. Everyone in the crowd does the same. It's an old ritual at funerals. It means thanks and admiration. It means goodbye to someone you love.

Now I truly am in danger of tears. Fortunately, Haymitch decides to take the attention away from me. He crosses the stage to where I stand. "Look at her. Look at this one!" He hollers to the crowd. He throws an arm around my shoulders. He's surprisingly strong for such a heavy drinker. "I like her!" His breath reeks of spirits and it's been a while since he's bathed. "Lots of…" He can't think of a word. "Spunk!" He says triumphantly. "More than you!" He shouts directly at the camera. Is he taunting the Capital? I'll never know because he opens his mouth an dsteps off the stage, plummeting to the ground below. Knocks himself unconscious.

He's disgusting but I'm grateful for the distraction. I take a minute to compose myself, letting out a small sound like a hiccup.

Effie stands. "Well this has been quite exciting now hasn't it?" Men with a stretcher come and take Haymitch into the Justice Building. Effie crosses the stage to the boy's blue ball. She reaches in and takes out a paper and slowly, agonizingly, walks to the podium.

Effie reads it one more time and says, "Hiccup Haddock." _Oh no. Not him_, I think. The scrawny brunette shakily walks to the stage and stands beside me. Effie asks for any volunteers but no one pipes up. Family and friendship only goes so far on the Reaping day. Hiccup and I shake hands and the anthem plays. The peacekeepers usher us into the Justice Building and into separate rooms. I think about what lays ahead. _Will I get killed?_ Well of course I will. Mum and the boys will have to live without me. Then I think about Hiccup Haddock. How will I be able to kill him? Odds are that he will be killed first but then again odds have not been in my favor recently.

**I hope ya'll like it! I just think that Katniss and Merida have so much in common. Same with Hiccup and Peeta. So see ya'll around. Yay!**


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

As soon as the anthem ends, we're whisked away by Effie into the Justice Building. The peacekeepers surround us, making me feel as though I'm a criminal. They only do this because many tributes have tried to escape in the past, though I've never seen it.

Once inside, I'm conducted into a room and left alone. It's the richest place I've ever been in, thick, deep carpets and a velvet couch and chairs. I know velvet because my mother has a dress with a collar made out of this stuff. When I sit on the couch, I can't help but run my fingers over the fabric repeatedly. It helps calm before the next hour. The time allotted for tributes to say good bye to loved ones. I cannot afford to get upset, to leave this room with puffy eyes and a red nose, for crying is not an option. There will be cameras at the train station.

My brothers and my mother come in first. Mother's long hair is still in their intricate loops but the gray hair is unraveling. The wee devils are standing by her legs fearfully, as if I have already gone crazy because of the Games. I hold out my arms and all three triplets snuggle their way in. Mother sits beside me, stroking my red hair.

After a moment of this, I begin telling them what they must do, "Hamish, Harris, and Hubert, you are not to take any tesserae. You can use my bows as I've taught you." All three boys nod, their red wooly hair brushing against my arms. I turn to my mother, ready to instruct her. "you can live off what you shoot and get from the goat. Mother, you know who to sell to and who not to." Mother nods gravelly, her chin quivering.

Too early, the peacekeepers come and lead the boys and Mother away. I give them a final hug and whisper I love you to all of them.

The next visitor is a surprise, Madge, the mayor's daughter who is four years younger than me, walks in. She twirls something in her grasp before thrusting it out awkwardly.

"Rose is a good friend of mine and I want you to have this," She says, just as awkwardly. I take what is in her outstretched palm and circle it in my own. It is a small badge with a mockingjay in the middle. These little birds are something of a smack in the face of the Capitol. They first started out as jabberjays, small birds that can replicate a human conversation. The rebels figured this out and started coding their conversations and the Capitol scientists released the jabberjays into the wild to die of extinction. However, before the jabberjays all died, they mated with female mockingbirds and created a mockingjay, a bird that could replicate a human whistle or melody.

Madge takes the pin from me and fastens it to my chest, just below my left shoulder, "You'll wear this into the arena, right Merida?" I nod and she smiles a friendly smile and a nod of encouragement to me before walking out of the room.

The next visitor is another surprise, the blacksmith, Hiccup's father. Normally, a blacksmith would be arrested for the possibility of creating weapons. Hiccup's father makes horseshoes, for the people rich enough to own a horse not to mention pay for shoes. He also makes lean to houses for the poor and fixes the peacekeeper guns.

The blacksmith sits awkwardly on the edge of one of the plush chairs. He is a big, broad-shouldered man with burn scars from years at the mantel. He must have just said good bye to his son.

He pulls a white paper package from his jacket pocket and holds it out to me. I open it and find a purple wildflower in a pile of dirt.

"I, uh, heard that there aren't many flowers in the Capital," The blacksmith grunts. He's not a very talkative man, at times, he has no voice at all.

"Thank you," I say. I notice his maroon hair and smile, I'm not the only red-head in district twelve. "You once helped my friend, Gale. His house was falling apart." The large man nods and we sit in silence until a peacekeeper summons him.

He coughs and rises, "I'll keep an eye on the girl, make sure she's, uh, eating." I feel pressure leave my chest at his words. People deal with me, but adore Prim. Maybe there will be enough fondness to keep her alive.

A few minutes later, Gale rushes in. Maybe there's nothing romantic between us, but when he opens his arms I don't hesitate to go into them. His body is familiar, warm, comforting.

"Listen," He says. "Getting a knife will be easy, but you've got to get your hands on a bow. That's your best chance."

"They don't always have bows," I say, thinking of the year there were only horribly spiked maces that the tributes had to bludgeon one another to death with.

"Then make one," says Gale. "Even a weak bow is better than no bow at all."

I have tried to copy my father's handiwork for years with no success, "I don't even know if there will be wood." Another year, they tossed everybody into a landscape of nothing but boulders and sand and scruffy bushes. I particularly hated that year, so many were bitten by snakes or went insane with thirst.

"There's almost always some wood," Gale says. "Since the year half of them died of cold. Not much entertainment in that."

It's true, we spent one Hunger Games watching the players freeze to death at night. You could hardly see them because they were huddled in balls and had no wood for fires or torches or anything. It was considered very anticlimactic in the Capitol, all those quiet, bloodless deaths, since, there has been wood.

"Yes there is some," I say.

"Merida, you're the best hunter I know, it's just hunting."

"It's not hunting. They are armed. They think," I say.

"So do you, and you've had more practice. Real practice," He says. "You know how to kill."

"Not people," I say.

"How different can it be, really?" says Gale grimly.

The awful thing is that I can forget they're people, it will be no different than killing a squirrel.

The Peacekeepers come back too soon and Gale asks for more time, but they're taking him away and I start to panic, "Don't let the boys starve!" I cry out and cling to his hand.

"I wont! Merida, you-" The door slams, cutting off Gale's words.

It's a short ride from the Justice Building to the train station. I've never been in a car before. I've rarely ever ridden on a wagon. In the Seam, we travel on foot.

I've been right about not crying. The station is swarmed with reporters with their insect like cameras trained on my face. I notice a television and feel gratified that I look pissed.

Hiccup Haddock, on the other hand, has obviously been crying. Maybe he'll work that as a strategy, to look weak and frightened, so the careers over look you.

We have to stand a few moments and wait for the train to open it's doors. When they do, I gladly scurry up the stairs to the compartments inside. As soon as everyone is on, we part immediately.

The speed astounds me. Of course, I've never been on a train, but this is no ordinary coal train that comes to deliver coal across Panem. This train is sleek, fancy and travels 250 miles an hour at it's fastest. The journey to the Capitol will take less than a day.

In school, they tell ys that the Capitol is located in a place once called the Rocky Mountains. District Twelve is somewhere in the Appalachian Mountains. Panem is in someplace once called North America.

The tribute train is even nicer than the Justice Building back home. The compartments have their own bathrooms with a keypad for the shower. The drawers are filled with fine clothing that Effie Trinket tells me is at my disposal.

Soon Effie comes to collect me for dinner. I don't have an appetite but I walk out to the diner hall anyways. Inside the car, Haymitch and Hiccup are already sitting at the table. I sit across from Hiccup and a servant comes to my side almost immediately. I wave them off but accept a glass of water.

Haymitch is busy drinking himself silly and Hiccup stares at the wooden table. I glare out the window. Everyone is quiet in the speeding train.

I suddenly wish that my father were here, telling his story of how his leg nearly got bitten off by what he calls "A demon bear." I wish that the boys were here, making mischief by tying the dinner table to father's leg. And Mum, I wish she were here telling me not to stuff my mouth and that sheep's stomach is good for us.

Suddenly, Haymitch bursts out laughing and between giggles, he says to me, "Don't you look like someone pissed in your cereal." I feel my temper rising with each laugh. Before I know what's happening, I have a steak knife pointed at the drunk's throat.

"Don't you _dare _laugh at me," I say.

Haymitch only glances at the knife and says, "Ooh, redhead getting feisty!" I grip the knife harder and raise it to swipe before I feel someone pulling me by the shoulders.

"Calm down, Merida," Hiccup says. He wrenches the knife out of my grasp. The brunette boy pushes me into the seat with more force than I thought he had. "Let's just all calm down."

I glare at the twit, "Then what? Hold hands and sing Kumbaya?"

Haymitch glances between Hiccup, the knife, and me, "Is this so?"

"What?" I bark.

"Show me what you can do with that knife," Haymitch directs.

I grip the handle and flip the knife, so I'm holding the blade, and throw it into the wooden wall. It sticks to it, making me look like a better shot than I really am.

I glance back at the intoxicated man, "Happy?"

He takes a sip of wine, "Very." He sets down the glass and looks at Hiccup. "What abut you, boy, what can you do?"

Hiccup shrugs, "Not much, carry Peacekeeper guns and swords to the mantle and back."

I roll my eyes, "Oh come on, you can make a slingshot out of a twig and some pine sap."

"That was when I was little!" Hiccup retorts.

"Face it, you're an engineer, where as I can't even make a toy bow!" I say.

Haymitch holds up his hands, "Okay so Redhead can shoot weapons and Skinny Twit can make almost anything." He glances up at us. "It seems I have some survivors."

I'm about to ask what he means, when Hiccup says, "Look, the Capital!" Haymitch shuffles out to his compartment. I look out the window to where the gleaming Capital sits, it's candy colors glowing on the waters of a giant silver lake.

We pull into the station and hundreds of crazy looking people gawk at the train, waving wildly. Their bright colorful features seem twisted and scary. Hiccup waves to the people, ignoring their weird choices of color.

He notices me staring disgustedly and says simply, "One of them could be rich and help me in the arena. " All of a sudden, I know this boy's plan. He was only looking weak on purpose to get sympathy from a rich capital citizen. I glare at his back and think, _You want to play that way? We can play that way, Hiccup Haddock._

**Sorry for the long wait! I really forgot about this. Whoops. More next week, I swearzies.**


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